Czech Republic - Prague

Prague was, hands down, the best city that Elizabeth visited. Their airbnb host sent a driver to the airport to pick them up, and the drive into the city was beautifully scenic. The airbnb was situated in the Old Town area of the city, so they were right in the thick of all the historical landmarks and culture.

On Saturday, after dropping off their luggage at the airbnb, the girls set out to explore the city. They crossed one of Prague's many bridges and hiked up to the famous Prague castle. They then proceeded to climb up the castle tower (over 280 steps) from which they could see a panoramic view of the city. Unfortunately the skies opened up and it poured and thundered for about two hours (this was actually really cool to see from the tower!). Luckily Abby, Sophia and Elizabeth were prepared for this to happen and they managed to fill the time by eating lunch at the castle's cafe.

They explored more of the city in the evening, going to the Old Square and the Charles Bridge, and stopping in a bunch of touristy shops. On Sunday, they got brunch and continued to walk around and take in the city, enjoying time in parks and a flea market. Prague was a really relaxing and enjoyable experience for all of them and they wished that we had more time there! Shoutout to Lee's cousin Alison for recommending places to visit and eat in Prague.

Elizabeth's favorite view of the castle.

Prague Castle

Charles Bridge

Poland - Krakow and Auschwitz-Birkenau

Elizabeth's travel through Germany and Poland was without a doubt the most difficult part of her entire study abroad experience. She and her friends encountered every problem that could exist, beginning with security issues in the Amsterdam Airport, a delayed flight, rude customs officers in Germany, the overnight bus being delayed by an hour, then their bus seats simply not existing on the bus, very few English speakers in Poland, and more.

They traveled to Poland to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau; their tour was scheduled for 12:15pm, but it was abruptly changed to 2:40. All trains from Krakow to Oswiecim appeared nonexistent, even though they checked all details before the trip. A train station officer helped them find a train to a different town and told them they would be able to get to Auschwitz from there, so they hopped on a train and hoped for the best. The ride was two hours, and then they were told to take a bus to Oswiecim. From there, they waited for a shuttle to Auschwitz and then waited 30 minutes for their tour guide; when it became clear that their tour guide was never going to show up, they decided that they would go in by themselves.

It was an incredibly frustrating process, but in the end, all that mattered was that they made it to the memorial, and were able to see Auschwitz-Birkenau ourselves. It was a place that all of us were really looking forward to seeing and even though we were unable to get the full experience, it was still very moving.

It took roughly 4 hours to get back to Krakow; waiting for shuttles that never came, walking 20 minutes to a bus stop, no running trains, etc. They eventually made it onto a bus where they stood in the aisle throughout the hour drive back to Krakow, finally arriving at their AirBnB at 10pm!

Germany and Poland were definitely interesting and exhausting experiences. They had to make a lot of adjustments, keep calm, and learn a lot of life lessons. They also discovered that one of the best ways to keep a positive mindset is to use humor to get through.

In the Berlin airport.

Auschwitz-Birkenau

Inside the camp.

Old town Krakow

They were able to budget enough money to get a really nice apartment in a safe part of Krakow, which was a pleasant surprise after their exhausting day. 

Netherlands - The Hague & Amsterdam

The last educational leg of Elizabeth's study abroad trip ended this past week in the Netherlands. After arriving on Monday night, she spent Tuesday and part of Wednesday in the city of The Hague, a coastal city which hosts two international organizations; the OPCW (organization for the prevention of chemical weapons) and the ICC (international criminal court).

She visited the OPCW on Tuesday, where she met with an officer from the public affairs division, who explained the values and processes of the OPCW, then fielded questions from her class for almost 30 minutes. It was definitely her favorite of the organizations they visited - the representative was very informed and discussed parts of the OPCW that applied to multiple majors and career paths. The rest of Tuesday was free for the students so they took the opportunity to visit the coast of the North Sea.

On Wednesday morning, her class had its last international organization meeting: the ICC. Unfortunately, the trial that they were scheduled to sit in on was delayed two weeks, so instead, they had a presentation followed by a Q&A. While very informative, everyone was definitely sad to have missed the trial!

In the afternoon, her class split in half: they were given the choice to either return back to Paris or continue on to Amsterdam. Naturally, Sophia, Abby and Elizabeth joined the group going to Amsterdam. On Wednesday night, they stayed in a hostel, meeting up with classmates to go out and explore as well. Thursday consisted of a canal tour in the morning, followed by the Van Goh museum and dinner with one of our professors.

Belgium - Brussels & Brugge

Elizabeth's political science class spent last weekend in the country of Belgium. After a morning train on Saturday, they arrived in Brussels, the capital of Belgium. The rest of Saturday was spent exploring the Grand-Place, as well as a visit to the European Parliament building. Unfortunately, the Parliament was not in session so they were unable to see the actual chamber; they were, however, able to tour the rest of the building.

On Sunday, Elizabeth and her associate professor organized a day trip to Brugge, another city in Belgium. A small group of students took the train out to Brugge, where they spent the day exploring the small city. The highlight of this day trip was definitely the chocolate; there were chocolatiers every other store front and they all ate too much!

Monday entailed a trip to NATO headquarters, where they had three back to back meetings with NATO officials about security issues within and also outside the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. As a national security major, these meetings were incredibly interesting and provided Elizabeth with insight on security priorities in other regions of the world.

Belgium is definitely at the top of Elizabeth's list of countries so far. The architecture of both Brussels and Brugge was incredible beautiful, and the food was excellent. She tasted two of Belgium's famous dishes, waffles and mussels, both of which were quite good. She also visited Mannequin Pis, one of Brussels' most comical, yet famous landmarks.

Monday night consists of a train to the Netherlands, and specifically The Hague, where she will spend the next two days.

Belgium waffle

The best hot chocolate in Belgium.

European Parliament

NATO Headquarters. They were not allowed to take photos inside.

Switzerland - Geneva

In the early morning hours of Tuesday, June 6, Elizabeth's political science class boarded a 3 hour high-speed train to Switzerland, arriving around 9am in Geneva. After dropping their bags at the hotel, they rode the tram into Geneva's international district where they met with a representative of the World Health Organization (WHO) for the afternoon. They engaged in a lengthy discussion of the history of WHO, its core values and missions, as well as an in-depth look into the international affects of the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines.

This was the first of 5 meetings over the next three days: on Wednesday, they met with a communications offers from the World Trade Organization, followed by a meeting with admissions representatives at the Geneva Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Interdisciplinary Studies. On Thursday, they met with the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, followed immediately by a tour of the United Nations Headquarters.

This class trip to Switzerland was packed with official meetings and tours, however, some time was allotted for exploration of the city. Elizabeth and her friends managed to accidentally stumble upon the oldest restaurant in Geneva for dinner, sampled Swiss chocolate from various chocolatiers, and swam in Lake Geneva.

She found that the train rides in and out of Switzerland provided the most breathtaking views of the trip. While Geneva was an excellent city for us nerdy political science majors, it is certainly not as photogenic as the mountains and rivers the rain passed. 

Overall, Switzerland was incredibly educational, beautiful, and definitely flew by quick! Now it's back to Paris for one more day, then the back-to-back journey to Belgium, The Netherlands, German, Poland and the Czech Republic begins.

At the WTO

The famous Geneva Geyser